


#28 Doing something ridiculous

by 221_french_bee



Series: 30 Days OTP Challenge [9]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Teenagers, M/M, Mystrade Valentines Calendar 2018, Pining Greg, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Pre-Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade, Pre-Relationship, Sherlock is a Brat, Teen Mycroft, Teen Romance, Teenagers, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-12 19:01:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13553616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221_french_bee/pseuds/221_french_bee
Summary: Greg has been helping the gardener at the Holmes house, and Mycroft hadn’t been able to tamper his attraction for the teen as he ogled from his windows. On Valentine’s Day, when Gregory arrives on this motorcycle and asks to speak to Mycroft, he is hopeful their romantic relationship is finally taking its first steps. But will Sherlock’s shenanigans keep them away from each other?John is amazed, Sherlock is a little brat, and both Greg and Mycroft are pining idiots!





	#28 Doing something ridiculous

**Author's Note:**

> In this story, both John and Sherlock are 10 years old. Mycroft is 17, with Greg slightly older, around 18 years old.
> 
> English is not my first language, and I can easily miss spelling or grammar mistakes. So please tell me if there's still things to change in the text!

John loved the Holmes family's house. It was huge, with gigantic stairs and a lot of tiny spaces perfect to play hide-and-seek with Sherlock. Sure, it always took ages to find and then come back from the loo, but the 10-year-old boy was sure it was worth it.  
He was in fact coming from the bathroom, his socked feet nearly silent on the fluffy carpets of the corridors. He has left his muddy shoes in the foyer, next to Sherlock’s one as well as the brunette’s pirate hat. Both boys had been playing outside in the garden with Readbeard all morning, reliving to be finally able to play outside. The last couple of days had been rainy, and Sherlock’s parents have been relieved to let the boys go outside to let them get some stream off. It had also allowed Mrs. Hudson, the lovely housekeeper, to finally access Sherlock’s room to clean it of the many, many experiments that the boys had performed this last couple of days and were starting to make the whole house smell.  
So out they have been send, screaming at the top of their lungs, happy and red faced under the many layers of warm scarf, beanies, and coats Sherlock’s parents had insisted on, thanks to the chilly wind of February.

John had been staying at the Holmes house for the last couple of days, and he was enjoying himself enormously. His parents have been all too happy to let John stay with his friend as they had apparently planned a long week-end outside of the county. John had overheard them talk about how they rented a room in an inn in the countryside because of someone called Valentine? But John hadn’t really paid attention, only happy to be able to spend time at his friend’s house.

John finally made it back to the rear of the house were the garden was, but Sherlock was nowhere to bee seen, and Readbeard was sleeping in front of the fireplace in the kitchen. After a few minutes of searching, John found his friend sitting on the floor, his ear stuck to one of the door of the living room.

John approached, intrigued by his friend's behavior.

“Sherlock, what are you-”

“Shh!” snapped Sherlock with a quick wave of hand, “Be quiet John, or they’re going to hear us.”

“Who?”, asked John, carefully lowing his voice to a whisper.

“Mycroft and that boy, Lestrade.”

John frowned.

“What's Greg doing here?”

“Who?”

“Greg. Greg Lestrade? Isn't it what you've just said?”

“Is that his name? Anyways,” Sherlock continued, clearly uninterested by John's answer, “he had a crush on Mycroft for months. And as I’ve expected, today he is going to ask him out.”

John beamed. “What? Really?”

“Of course!” Sherlock really liked to say that, using it to show off to anyone who wanted to hear him, “Haven’t you see his stupid smile when he arrived?”

John decided not to tell Sherlock that he couldn't have noticed anything because he wasn't even there when the boy had arrived. His experience told him that Sherlock would not consider his lack of presence as a valid argument. So he simply sat next to his friend, and mimicked his pose by putting his ear on the hard wood door. He could hear footsteps and voices coming from the other side of the door, indicating that Mycroft and Greg were coming from the vestibule to the room.

John had met Gregory Lestrade before. Around Mycroft age, the teen was the son of one of Mrs. Holmes friend. He came regularly to the Holmes’s house to help the gardener during summer to gain some pocket money. He was always friendly and smiling, ruffling John hair when the blond came around, and he had never been afraid of Sherlock’s sour moods. His easy going nature was contagious, and even if he was deemed as “an idiot” by Sherlock, he exited the brunette wrath when Sherlock failed to trick the young man into getting him sweets from the pantry. John was always happy to see Greg around, and he would have run into the room to say hi if Sherlock’s attitude hadn’t held him back.

“Why are we spying on them?” he inquired.

“Because I want to hear them. I’ve been observing them for weeks now. Fatcroft is always sweatier than usual when Lestrade come to the house, and he spends hours looking at him, hidden by the curtain of his bedroom. And have you seen how Lestrade parade around him whenever he comes to help the gardener? Always trying to look cool with his motorcycle and his leather jacket.” Sherlock rolled his eyes with a snort.  
John retained a comment about Sherlock’s own affection for dramatics.

“Anyway. As I’ve predicted ages ago, he is for some reason infatuated with my brother, and intend to ask him out. Why he has not attempted is sooner I don’t know, but today is the perfect opportunities.”

“Why? Because it’s a Sunday?”

Sherlock looked at John like he was shocked to have a friend that dense.

“Of course not! We are the 14th of February John. Haven’t you heard is the lover’s day?”

John squeaked in glee. Love? His big sister was also in love! She told him not to tell their parents when he walked on her kissing with her girlfriend.

Because even if John was only ten year old, he already known what kissing was, thank you very much! He had already kissed Mary Morstan during recess! But Sherlock had been very mean with him for a whole week after, so John had not kissed her again, even when she asked him with her big puppy eyes. Sherlock was more interesting than her anyways.  
But John loved to hear about love stories. His friends often made fun of him, but his favorite part of any fairytale was when the prince confessed his love. He was confused why it was always to a princess and not sometime to another prince, but still, it was always his favorite part.  

“So you are waiting for them to kiss?”

Sherlock shaked his head, “Nope, that’s not what I planned.”

“Oh, you want to hear the groping!” exclaimed John with naive interest.

'Groping' was a new word his sister had learned him. She told him that she often did it with her girlfriend Clara. If Greg was going to ask Mycroft out as Clara has did with Harry, surely they'd be groping too?  
The girls did it in Harry's bedroom, with the door closed, but John could sometimes hear laughs coming from inside. Groping, to John opinion, seems rather fun so he had consider the idea to propose Sherlock to try it with him. Girls always come out from 'groping' with big smiles on their faces, and John loved to see Sherlock smile.

But for the moment the boy's face was distorted with a grimace of disgust.

“Yuck, hell no! Who would want to hear that? I'd rather pour acid directly on my brain through my ears!”

“Oh, ok.” John’s tone was a bit disappointed. Sherlock's reaction wasn't what he had intended. Better not to ask about 'groping' with him, then. “So why do we listen them?”

“You'll see,” answered Sherlock, offering John his best conspiratorial smile.

They fell silent when they heard the boys enter in the salon, settling a bit more against the door to listen to the teenagers inside.

“Please, take a sit, Gregory”, Mycroft was saying, his tone polite, yet a little bit tense “Do you desire some tea? I can have some ordered if you want.”

“No, not at all. I'm fine, don't bo-”

Abruptly, his sentence was cut by a hideous, very loud and long farting noise that died in a horrendous squeak. A deafening silence then fell on the scene. The very air seemed to halt as the participants tried to process what they had just heard. On the other side of the door, John was frozen in place; a shocked expression on his face that surely mirrored both of the teenagers’ faces inside the room.

“I’m not... It wasn't me!” Greg's voice finally broke the silence, his tone mortified and hurried, “I swear I'm not-”

“Don't concern yourself Gregory, I know that some natural bodily reactions can sometimes be quite unexp-”

But another farting noise, even louder if it was possible, interrupted him too. John slammed his hand on his mouth, trying to contain a manic laugh.  
At his side, Sherlock was still smiling, watching John’s reaction with attention and obvious delight.

“Well, it seems like I'm not the only one with 'natural bodily reactions' ”.

“I didn't emit anything of the sort!”, exclaimed Mycroft.

“Well, it's certainly not me either. It must be the chair, then.”

Greg was obviously teasing, his tone ironic, but Mycroft replied with full seriousness.

“In fact, you may be right about that.”

There was the sound moving leg’s chair against the floor, torn tissue, then an exclamation.

“A whoopee cushion?”

Keeping his ear on the door, John glanced at Sherlock and was bemused to see that the boy's grin has never been bigger. John also realized that Sherlock hadn't flinched at either of the farting noises, even like he were expecting it...  
John's eyes widened as the penny dropped: Sherlock wasn't there to hear his brother being asked out, he was there to hear the result of a meticulously prepared prank!  
John looked at Sherlock with a stunned expression, mixed with some reverence. As usual, Sherlock was incredible, even with the silliest motivation.

“SHERLOCK!”

They startled as a genuine howl of rage came from the inside of the room. Mycroft's voice was deformed with wrath. The teenager had obviously reached the same conclusion as John, but with quite a different reaction. There was a ruffle in the room, then footsteps getting louder, indicating that the teenager was coming closer to the door.

Sherlock pleased grin was immediately replaced with panic.

“John, run! Quick!”

Both boys jumped on their feet a second before the door burst open.

“I'm going to skin you!”

John caught a glimpse of Mycroft's expression, his face white with rage, his freckles standing out almost comically against his nose, before the boy ran upstairs after Sherlock.

Mycroft's curses and Greg's laughter followed them until the ginger teen finally abandoned the hunt, mostly because he was afraid to seems even more ridiculous by appearing out of breath and sweaty in front of Gregory. Ears ringing with anger, he posed at the end of the stairs to take a deep breath before coming back to the room where Greg was wiping his tears. The teen was standing and holding to the backrest of one of the chair.

“Well, your brother really is something, isn't he?”

Mycroft felt his face heat up.

“Gregory, I can't apologize enough for Sherlock’s comportment. He is truly inexcusable.”

Greg’s laughter abated, but he kept a smirk on his face.

“Nah, it's fine. It was even kind of fun, when we found that it was a whoopee cushion.”

“Do you think so?” asked Mycroft with a pinched tone.

They both unpicked the fabric of Greg’s chair to take out the second whoopee cushion that Sherlock had hidden here. Mommy will be furious when she’ll find out what Sherlock had done to her chairs. Mycroft recalled that she had been complaining about the disappearance of her embroidery scissor. He guessed they were hidden in Sherlock’s room with some needle and thread of a color matching the one of the cushions.  
They carefully put the whoopee cushions away on a table, where they emitted a pathetic wheezing noise before deflating completely. Mycroft eyed them with a grim look as both teens resumed their position on now flattened, but thankfully free of unpleasant surprises, chairs.

“Well, your face was funny”, said Greg, “And ok, it was a childish prank, but mostly harmless and ridiculous.”

Mycroft huffed in annoyance, his rage flaming against his little brother and his demonic schemes.

“I don’t want you to find my face funny!”

Mycroft regretted his words as soon as they left his mouth. What an idiotic thing to say! He, who so carefully tried to appear on his beast behavior every time he was faced with the other teen, was now making a fool of himself. Not that it was the first time, he mused. Last summer, when Greg came to help the gardener with some tasks, Mycroft has barely be able to control his lust faced with a sweaty, tanned, tanks-top wearing Gregory Lestrade when they had met at the door of the kitchen as Gregory came to the house to drink some tap water. He had shuttered, trying not to ogle at Greg muscular arms and failing to align more than a few words. The last days of summer had put an end to Greg’s activities with the gardener, and Mycroft had mourned the end of their nearly daily interaction. But when Mr. Holmes had requested help to put the back garden and beehives in winter condition, Greg had been called back to help.  
Mycroft reminded of this day with perfect clarity. Greg hadn’t come with his parent’s car, but with his brand new motorcycle. Mycroft, who was in charge of looking after Sherlock as the boy was climbing to one the house tree to collect “samples” for one of his experiment, had almost choked himself with his own saliva and had barely be able greet him. Gregory Lestrade with a leather jacket mounted on a gleaming motorcycle would be the epitome of any sexual fantasy he will ever have, he was sure of it.  
After his encounter, he had promised himself to do better, and had managed to appear somewhat more controlled during the following interactions hey had since then.

This morning, he hadn’t really paid attention to the date until he had spotted Greg on the road in front of the mansion. Mycroft had been surprised, as he hadn’t heard his dad speaking about any gardening or repairing job planned today. But when he had been told that Mr. Lestrade had expressly requested to see him, he had suddenly realized what day it was. With only a minute to spare, he had tried to flatten his ginger hair and straightened the lines of his clothes in the mirror of the corridor before greeting Gregory as graciously as possible.

When he had spotted a shy smile and the nervous tremble on Greg’s hand, he had crazily thought that maybe it was his cue? Maybe Greg had made the trip especially to see him? And maybe he will be brave enough to talk to Gregory and make him understand that he wanted more than a friendship with him? And maybe, if he was very lucky, maybe Gregory will want to give them a go as boyfriends and take Mycroft out on his motorbike?

But now, Sherlock had ruined every chance he could have had. The tiny demon disguised as his bother had humiliated him and made him look like a fool in front of Gregory. Nobody wanted an overweight, sweaty and roaring boyfriend, with an obnoxious little brother and a house full of traps. So Mycroft prepared himself to hear whatever excuse Greg would find to justify never coming back to see him again, his face ready to hide his sorrow with a stoic expression.

But he found himself quite mistaken when Greg replied with a gentle voice.

“Sorry, I didn't intended to mock you. I don’t find your face funny, Mycroft.”

“You don’t ?”

Greg looked at Mycroft’s with a nervous expression, but with a loving smirk on his face. Mycroft exclamation was so incredulous that it was almost comical, in a sad way.

“No, I've always found you cute more than anything else.”

Mycroft freezed on his chair, his mouth slightly agape. Greg seemed to gather his courage before continuing,

“In fact, I find you more than cute. That was I wanted to tell you before we were... interrupted.”

He stepped out of his chair and came to kneel in front of Mycroft. He didn't try to touch him, but he was close enough for the other teen to be mesmerized by the gentle glint in his brown eyes.

“Oh...” exhaled Mycroft. He wished to find a more eloquent response, but his brain had apparently shut down, entirely distracted by Greg's sudden closeness.

The teen hesitated, gauging his reaction.

“And I’ve… I’ve felt that way for a long time now. And I was asking myself if you… well, if you’ve find me cute too? I mean,” he quickly added, “It's ok if it's not always. Just sometimes will do.”

Gregory's bravery seems to deflate when Mycroft stayed silent. His face fell and he slowly shifted his weight on his heels, ready to stand up, when Mycroft reached for him. Mycroft felt Greg’s hand on his, and he gripped the warm fingers with his own in a gentle, yet assured, grip.

Mycroft was feeling a bit light heated, and he was sure he was spotting a ridiculous smile, but he couldn’t care less, because Gregory - handsome, funny, perfect Gregory - actually found him _cute_. What an understatement for a far more powerful sentiment!

“I can assure you, I find you far more than cute,” started Mycroft. He stopped a second to fetch his courage. Gregory had been kind enough to voice his sentiments, so it was only fair he tried to meet him halfway. “I've always found you gorgeous Gregory. And…”

He stopped, anchored his eyes on Greg's ones before finishing, “and if you want the same thing, I would love us becoming more than friends.”

Greg’s eyes were shining, and their joined hands were gently shaking. Mycroft couldn’t have said who was gripping the other harder.

“Can I take you on a date then? Will you let me call you my valentine for today, and then for all the days after if you want me to?”

Mycroft felt his heart swoon.

“I would love nothing more than to call you my valentine, Gregory.”

Greg’s smile was beaming when he gently pulled Mycroft to him until their lips met for a kiss, which indeed turned into, as John will finally discover years later with Sherlock's help, a fantastic groping session.


End file.
